Irene
by Wayfaring Snowflake
Summary: There was no reason for her to love him, so why did she? After she had been hurt as a younger teenage girl who got married too early, she had never loved again. Not truly. At least, she hadn't until she met Sherlock Holmes. Now, though, even he was gone.


**~~Irene Adler~~**

She stared at her computer screen in horror. There was no way on Earth that that man had let himself die so easily. He would never so willingly give up his life to Jim Moriarty. Of course, she knew already that Jim had died on the top of the building – she knew Jim. It was his sort of thing to do, really. A type of blackmail. There had to be a catch, though. Something forcing Sherlock Holmes to move the way he had. The Reichenbach Hero – fallen.

Sherlock Holmes had not been a fake. If there was anything in the world that she could be sure about, it would be that. What, with her previous marriage to Jim and all. _I suppose I need to mention that. _When they were younger, Irene had been lovestruck. James Moriarty was a charmer and more, if anything else. When she looked back now, though, she wondered if any of it was real. He was indeed a storyteller, but not the kind that the world believed him to be. No, he was more than a storyteller. He was an actor, and he was brilliant at what he did. The most dangerous kind of criminal simply because he can burn his tracks on his way. No, he never simply covered his footprints in the snow. James Moriarty would set fire to one thing and let it build until an entire nation was gone.

Lovestruck. They had only been teens when Jim and Irene married. Each family hate the other respective participant in the wedding – it was your typical Romeo and Juliet type of thing. Once they were married, though, things went sour. Jim was away more and more for "work," during which he was causing ruckus in the world. Still, though, Irene got pregnant. This made him mad, though. Irene had been a fun toy to play with for a little while. At that point she had simply been in his way. He couldn't put up with a child, so he got rid of this. Yes, James Moriarty was the reason that she had miscarried. Because of James Moriarty, she could no longer bear children. The idiot.

Then she met Sherlock Holmes. Of course, she had been working for Jim again when she met him. She was to serve as a distraction for him while James worked through the kinks in his break ins. When she met the Junior Holmes boy, there was something there that she hadn't been expecting. A spark.

She hadn't felt anything like this since she had first laid eyes on James Moriarty. There was something about the way he deduced. The way he spoke to her, in a sort of regard to her intelligence. She saw the way that he talked to other people and – for some reason – there was a difference. It didn't make sense, seeing as the man was a sociopath and had no visible sense of emotion, but that didn't matter anymore.

None of it did, really. He was gone. There was nothing anyone could do about it. She bent her head down in regard to him – the only man who she had ever truly fallen hard for. Sure, she had loved Jim, but not for who he was. She loved Jim the sensitive one. Jim the actor. Everything that had ever been between herself and Jim Moriarty had been fake. Sherlock had been real. _Very _real. A man like him could never love or be taught to love, but she loved him anyway. That was what killed her. That was what made her so upset.

There was no explanation as to why she would feel this way for junie. He was considerably younger than herself, and she had never had a proper conversation with him. The few times they had talked had been about the case – her case. The case that was supposed to have her dead at this point. Instead, though, she lived on. She lived on while he and his reputable image died. The Reichenbach Hero – a fake. It infuriated her to know that the idiots in the would would actually believe the story that had been created for him. That everything was false. None of it was truly real. That Sherlock Holmes had been a criminal. _Idiots, all of them._

With that, she lowered her face into her hands, still sitting with her computer on her lap. She was angry at Jim now. Losing her calm composure for a split second was enough to break her and all of a sudden she was in tears. She let out a gut-wrenching sob. They were tears of sorrow. Tears of pain. Tears on anger. She _hated _James Moriarty with a passion, and nothing in the world could be done about that.


End file.
